Has any other team traded more prospects over the last two years than the White Sox? How would you rank their current top five prospects?

Scott Reimers
Springfield, Ill.

Other clubs have been active on the trade market, such as the Red Sox and Royals, and the Marlins moved a lot of talent to add Jeff Conine, Mark Redman and Ugueth Urbina to their championship club last year. But no team can match the sheer volume of legitimate prospects the White Sox have traded since the beginning of 2003.

General manager Kenny Williams has dealt 11 players who appeared in either the 2003 or 2004 edition of the 2004 Prospect Handbook: lefthanders Tim Bittner and Royce Ring; righthanders Edwin Almonte, Franklin Francisco, Jon Rauch and Josh Rupe; infielders Tim Hummel, Aaron Miles and Michael Morse; and outfielders Jeremy Reed and Anthony Webster. Those players helped bring in Roberto Alomar, Carl Everett (twice), Freddy Garcia, Scott Schoeneweis, Scott Sullivan and Jose Uribe. It's hard to argue with the moves, but they haven't delivered the White Sox to the postseason yet.

Right now, I'd rank Chicago's top five prospects in this order: outfielders Brian Anderson, Ryan Sweeney and Chris Young; third baseman Josh Fields (the Sox' 2004 first-round pick); and righthander Felix Diaz. I didn't include outfielder Joe Borchard because he's up with the big league club and soon will exceed the rookie limit of 130 at-bats. The other notable omission is righthander Kris Honel, who has pitched just six innings this year because of a tender elbow. I'd put him third on the list if I knew he'd return to health and regain his velocity, which dipped into the low 80s. Two other pitchers worth mentioning are sleeper righty Brandon McCarthy and lefty Gio Gonzalez, a supplemental first-round pick in June.